An Introduction to Paranormal Psychology - with Chris French 

Amazing.... i look exactly like this guy. My double....

Had sleep paralysis as a teenager, got dragged off the bed my face, strangled, bounced around the room uncontrollably floating, and led to the ability to put my arm through a wall and feel each layer of the wall - tried leaving 'evidence' for years, such as knocking a cup over, only to find no cup in the location when I woke up. Discovered loads of great reading material on out-of-body experiences by Robert A Monroe, Rosalind McKnight and others, so can see how these things can lead to a belief in all things paranormal, a difficult feeling to shake off. Now I think of it as the greatest sleep disorder ever but probably the cause of all ridiculous religious beliefs as well.

I like this guy -- a true skeptic. Taking a negative stance on something that has no positive evidence, yet always open for positive evidence to prove his firm belief's wrong.

Something thought to be paranormal, if proved to exist, would then be called 'normal'.

My friends grandfather died, he went to get a tattoo, the tattoo artist hadnt ever seen him before, didnt know his grandfather, him, his family, nothing. The tattoo artist goes "you granddads sister _____ was waiting for him to cross over, he's fine" she got his granddads sisters name right. Coincidence aint it.

Glad to see that there’s other people like me: atheists who don’t necessarily support paranormal causation but are deeply interested in it nonetheless.

Pattern recognition drives cognition. We look for patterns and find them, real, or imagined. Science does it, too.

If you play this video backwards you can hear a clip of Stairway to Heaven. Spooky!

Non conscious muscular movement or how I finished an entire bag of chips.

I don't think I'm tripping when i notice this, but it seems that when he says choose one card and focus on it, then changes the slide. Each and every card is now different than the original set making you wrong no matter what card you chose.

Two of my experiences involved real people whom I saw and who spoke to me,and in both cases my life was in danger,and they saved my life,then these people simply disappeared.I would never have believed in anything like it.

Growing up I thought it completely normal to "fly" after going to sleep. However as a teenager I started getting the paralysis thing and that awful vibration feeling and being aware of leaving the body. I had no control over it, and it caused extreme anxiety. 20s onward I learnt to just go along with it and study what happened, how the atmosphere was very thick, and how movement happened more on will than effort. You could touch a window or you could put your hand through it, at will. These sorts of things happened usually when very tired. However, late thirties it was discovered that I had quite a serious thyroid disease which wasn't picked up (which they said was since birth). Anyway, on being treated with levo thyroxine, the astral travel stopped. However, I still have very clear dreams of deceased family members, usually around times of stress. No way to prove ane no way to disprove these things.

One of the most interesting aspects of this field is the meaning and role that luck plays into our lives. Our brains being conditioned to think that we control chance and luck.

I am very much in favor of discouraging people from superstition and religious belief without proof... however, I did experience some things that could only be classified as paranormal, even though I am a very skeptical and rational person. I even consider that I could have hallucinated, except for the fact that everyone else in the house I was living in at the time also experienced the same things. I'm not talking about strange noises that could be wind related or house settling -- I'm talking about a humanoid figure standing in front of you and moving in ways that nothing living or substantial could possibly do. I still don't like to say that I saw a "ghost" because I don't know if I believe in that. I just know that it couldn't have been a living human being, or any other kind of natural object that science could explain.

> Do ghosts exist - No > Is there any evidence for the paranormal? - No

Tarot cards are interesting as they don't necessarily have anything at all to do with psychic or the other side etc. There are only so many situations that happen to people, and those cards are laid out to read situations, could be new job, new relationship, weddings etc... It will obviously resonate more than not. The one good thing about them is they inspire solutions to the situation that the cards portray, the he encourage people to discuss their issues and counselling then applies. They make a good psychological tool.

One of the best lectures I’ve watched, loved it! 🙌

Great topic and speaker, thank you!

That effect of their muscles unconsciously moving the dowsing rods is pretty much the same as a Ouija board. They've actually done test with a Ouija board with a infrared and heat-sensitive camera to see the muscles did tense up to move the planchette

I have been using cold reading in my viva voce exams for a very long time to get good grades. It really works! My examiners, most often than not, think I know a lot while I just flunk the classes.

As soon as I heard the word skeptic I tuned out .

If you as a skeptic are claiming that these people who believe, are responsible for the out come, the flip side of that coin is, that you as an absolute skeptic had a much stronger influence on the out come than they did.

Backward masking is so much fun. And, in honesty, some groups actually started doing it to mess with people looking for them lol.

30:50 Yeah, I once had a horrible experience with that before. I woke up and couldn't move, yet instantly felt like I was being watched and that something was there. Moments later, I felt something grab my leg, while a shadow moved across my bed. A few seconds later, I was able to move and thus instantly shot out of my bed and ran to the opposite side of the house. Once the adrenaline wore off, I rationally pondered what happened and concluded--no matter how much my emotions were telling me differently--that I must have just been half-asleep.

Regarding the “satanic“ messages it might be worth taking into account that, wheneverwe hear something that sounds like speech, we usually try to make sense of it because that's what our brains are trained to do. Furthermore, we seem to stick to the language(es) we know when we hear words in any other language. For instance, some German speakers will hear “Anneliese Braun“ instead of “all the leaves are brown“ at the beginning of “California Dreamin“, along with tons of other nonsense that often follows the “you won't hear it until you read it“-scheme. Just google “misheard lyrics“, it's hilarious. Great lecture btw, really had a good laugh!

Fabulous. Great link to share so I do not need to waste time to explain the basics. 😊. Congratulations Professor 👏. Thank you to the organizers for sharing it.

I can only relate to a personal experience with dowsing: I bought this piece of land that had a stream just outside its limit, and wanted to know where to have a well dug within my land. Hired a dowser who dowsed while driving in the land and, while making sure I was looking at him in the process, used his little bar and pointed to a place in the land. Some days later, I hired a company specialising in wells and asked them where I could dig the well: they said "It's dead obvious: just as close to the stream as you legally can!". That was the point the dowser pointed at right before leaving with his money. Dowsing is the art of selling an ability you do not have, while hiding knowledge you do have about geology and water.

Quite a few symptoms of sleep paralysis match slow carbon monoxide poisoning. Just to be sure, speak to your gas supplier, or perhaps have your chimney checked.

Dowsing or however it's spelled. I was a locator for the local gas and energy company and we often had issues with the detection equipment we used. Gas lines have current run through a wire that traces the line, underground power lines of course are live and active at 60 Hertz. When the equipment failed we would take a marker flag that was made of ferrous metal, bend it a few inches up and tear the flag off then hold the rod in a way that lets it freely move.Mind you this is one single metal rod. When you pass over a live line, the magnetic field created by the alternating current will pull the rod in line with the direction of the flow of current. It's pretty standard in the industry and is very easy to verify with someone else's equipment. The issue is, anything that creates a magnetic field will pull the rod, cable line, phone line, a microwave, any transformer, water lines, ect. We did this mostly just to waste time while we waited for someone else to show up with a new receiver or transmitter.

He should dare himself in living in haunted houses nearby as research

Enjoyed this tremendously!

Really interesting talk.

Awesome talk. Keep it up!!

I enjoyed that, and it was a very helpful description of sleep paralysis which I personally have experienced several times in my life

Thank you man, great ... Your stuff is on very interesting theme. Priceless and incomparable to somewhat what RU-vid offers...

Excellent presentation Dr. French. I've don't work on pipeleaks, household and commercial throughout my 62 years. I've notice that when you are around a pipe or valve, it make a high frequency buzz or ring that or ears pick-up. Some people complain about their toilets keep running and the noise bothers them. It is usually a small leak or leaking valve that seems to be making the noises. Get information Dr. French.

I thought of 35, then almost changed my mind to 37. That is really interesting.

Very interesting. Great lecture.

Good speaker!

A fun topic for discussion... it always amazes me how ethnic, religious and cultural relics still remain in today's catalogue social behaviour. Apparently the 'science' of statistical analysis successful dispels any nostalgic attachment to past belief systems. 8:01 Informative and fun!!!

He linked paranormal and psychological pretty well, and I have no doubts. But one question remains, what extent of a 'paranormal' needs to occur to convince people like him that there may really be some phenomena that physics cannot explain.

I like his humor ;)

I don't really know about those people but I have Some weird shit experience with something I can't explain. It triggers depression, fear and frustration only won't be able to figure.

Magnetohydrodynamics might explain the tests done when actually finding water that is moving...but not when stationary.

That no friends joke really resonated with me

Barnum statements are amazingly fun to use on people!!

I'm skeptical about even my own skepticism

It's really great to understand the paranormal activities and phenomenon with paranormal psychological skepticism. Chris gave good examples of cold reading, Barnum effect, sleep paralysis, hypnotic regression, top-down processing etcetera. But I cannot find the reason that there are many people who can move things and do other stuff just by concentrating on it, it's also termed as psychokinesis. The definition says to exude energy from your mind to move or re-shape a physical object without handling it in any physical manner. How is it possible then? And why only a few people can do it. The second thing is which I read it in a book was that, dreaming is just like a war between consciousness and non-consciousness, and visual image production system of brain is selectively activated in sleep, my question is why the brain's memory mechanisms are so seriously disrupted during sleep that we cannot escape bizarre mental experiences that would otherwise occur only during madness?. Overall it was a great video, learned a lot from it.

I fell into the 1/3 of the population on picking the odd numbers and the 7 of Hearts, great fun, although it really meant nothing to me. Like him I picked 5, changed my mind and went with 7, that was a laugh. Very entertaining subject matter put on by a great entertainer. I like his sense of humor.

Directly under this video, I got an ad for a free tarot card reading. Surely they knew I wasn't going to click it.

I find paranormal stuff interesting but it's impossible to believe in lol. Great lecture

I don’t believe anything without proof, but I believe there is/are some thing/s beyond science and human mind

When more than one sober person experiences (sees/hears) something in great detail, and at the same time, something that is clearly "impossible" (according to the known laws of physics), and not in the context of a "magic show" or any other sort of "demonstration", or on any special occasion, etc., it matters not whether you call it a "shared hallucination", as was my own first thought, or the corn-ball word "paranormal". It was something, however ethereally present, that was not supposed to be there. In my long life I have had exactly 2 experiences like that - each entirely different. Each shared. In my opinion, anomalous events do occasionally occur. I don't think of that as highly significant, by the way. Climate change, and the 6th great species extinction are highly significant. The odd anomalous event not so much!

A good number of "dowsers" who charge money for it in fact have rare decades- or centuries-old local maps that show forgotten wells or streams that have long since been covered over. A farmer hires them to find a spot for a well, they look at their 150-year-old map to find the likeliest spots, and voila, all that remains is the performance.

I find this really entertaining for some reason, I felt the need to share that. Lol

That bit at the end is the same experience I have with the manic street preachers lyrics played forward.

There is no coincidences. You always experiance what you are supposed to experiance, and not something else. And yes, of course everything is connected with each other. The universe is using you as an instrument in many cases. It's all about making the choices. It's just multiple choice, since you dont have free will. But the more you know the more and better choices you can make

OMG I GOT 7 AND 37, IM SO CREEPED OUT AHAHAH NOOOOOOO

I knew an old fella years ago, Brian Hunwick, who was a water diviner in his younger years. He too was adamant other powers were responsible for his abilities, he called them for what he thought they were, not God or gods, but demons.

Simply Brilliant.

There was an SNL skit back in the day involving Satan and a tool shed, "anything goes." lol.

He avoided the topic of vivid sounds or images that have been experienced simultaneously by two or more people - without drugs lol.

Very Powerful

Why would anyone assume that Guessing a number, or any number of numbers would offer definite proof that there is or isn't such a thing as "The Paranormal"? So typical of people who have already made up their Mind about something! No wonder Skeptics, (Sceptics) are held in such esteem.

Any recommended books on the topic of ghosts, sleep paralysis and so forth?

My only rebuttal would be to view the experiment as you would the double slit experiment where a certain point of measurement breaks the wave function and causes different results... Still good vid

I liked hearing his perspectives. A health of dose of skepticism is always appreciated. His point about coincidences certainly has merit in most situations, but I think it's hard sell to dismiss all premonitions as just a matter of probability. I've dreamt about a few experiences over the years that are just so extraordinarily unlikely that it's very hard to think statistics were even a factor.

It is the water, drawing the person to it. New science has proved, that water is aware, and it has memory, and much, more than just sustaining all life on the planet. Like an entity, a life force, in a purposeful + necessary partnertnership, with all else in existence on earth, a major part of it also. We live in exciting times. Thank you for sharing your views and knowledge gained thru hand on experience . Very interesting, please keep us posted!! Cheers! Maggie

not to mention that if they were searching for water, the dowsing rods would point to themselves and other people because we are about one-third water...

Hm, a bit of constructive criticism. It would be interesting to hear what French has to say about a controlled study that seemingly turned out in favor of the psychic claims, like Russel Targ's Project Stargate. Also, regarding ouija boards and similar stuff, proving that it is the muscles of the participants that move the things is not a sufficient proof of no paranormal activity - you have to prove that those movements are not a result of something paranormal being able to puppeteer willing subjects. Especially if you assume it's something incorporeal like ghosts, who therefore should have some difficulty directly interacting with material objects, but may have just enough juice to cause some electromagnetic shenanigans. Personally, I would prefer a test focusing on the (in)ability of the test subjects to extract information that the participants couldn't have known otherwise, which would allow a clear proof of something definitely happening or not happening. Which brings me to how he tested the psychics. First of all, it is unclear what the normal rate is at which people of any particular kind should be (un)able to identify a personality reading that is objectively about them. This alone makes the test pointless, since you don't know what the chance rate of success should be without factoring that in (presumably making it lower than pure chance, since pobody's nerfect). Secondly, it becomes increasingly difficult to choose correctly which reading describes you best the more choices you have to differentiate between. That's why the choice should ideally be a binary one, a pair choice, between one correct and one incorrect reading (see Thurstone's law of comparative judgment). Three-way choice, like in the Carlson's test of astrology, is already problematic, let alone a five-way choice. Thirdly, without explaining what the psychic readings were like (what type of information they included), it is impossible to judge whether it had any chance of success at all, and therefore to assign any weight to the result of the test. Which means that it should never be left out from a presentation or summary of the test, but somehow always was left out from every presentation of any such test that I've ever seen on TV, including this one. PS: I may only have a master's degree in political science, but as French said, none of this is exactly rocket science.

Last night i fell asleep looking for my sister's old coworker on Facebook whorr cousin is my doppelganger. Thought of her for the first time in a decade....

This just affirms my reasons for loving Penn & Teller

I totally agree with him as far as skepticism is concerned.

Just a note here: I guessed 37 was going to be the number and here's the reason. He mentioned 3 in the first experiment, and he said the answer was 7 in that same experiment.

Amazing

Cool! This was far more interesting than I expected it to be. This guy knows me so well! He guessed my numbers, read out my unique personality. It's amazing! :p Well, to be fair, I guessed he'd ask about the 9 of clubs just before he asked a two digit number. I started with 22, like most of you and was like, odd? Damn it... Different digits? What's wrong with 22? I like 22. Just let me have 22, man! Fine, I'll take 37. Wait, the 7 was used, maybe he meant 35. Also: "She is _still_ in this position!" That cracked me up so hard XD

I'd love to see this guy in conversation with Rupert Sheldrake, in particular on the subject that people appear to know (para-normally?) when they are being observed (a phenomena for which there seems to be a lot of statistical evidence).

great points!! but we don't know everything, keep an open mind.

Oh yeah... go and spend a night (or day) in my daughters old house...see for yourself... don't knock it until you have "actually seen it".

I never believed in paranormal stuff until I saw it with my own eyes,

I thought the other night it was very late and I heard a noise coming from my kitchen and then time seemed to have changed As we know it. I can’t really explain but it was peculiar to say the least. I’m beginning to think the lady who Lived at this one bed flat before me is still here!? My ( for another example) bed headboard felt as if someone had Deliberately bashed into it around 2am in the morning but I live alone it’s not the only incident there are others I just thought I’d mention these.

I'm high, I thought the number 37 and as soon as I did he said "37" I got startled

I think there is water in the ground, under the sand filled bottles.

Hah! *cough**Acorah**cough* :D Interesting talk.

Have such people read anything by Eysenck, in particular Explaining The Unexplained?

2:38 Exactly what I thought of... 2:48 I thought of 35 but changed my mind as well. I fucking love psychology. 4:20 I take it your eyes are drawn to the one in the middle, meaning it's the one that stands out the most, making you pick it.

I like this man.

When i chose a card it disappeard???

I finally find a job that i can do investigate the explained to seek out the unanswered questions an to maybe find the truth.

Anybody trying to figure out the trick of cards? Intuition did help our ancestors to find food in modern times we don't need intuition anymore but it still exist

regards to sleep paralysis, is feeling an entity creep up from your feet towards your face and actually feeling the distinct pressure of hands and feet pressing on either side of you while they crawl on the mattress still a false positive? Because i remember i was completely mentally awake that moment. Can't really tell if it was paralysis because i did not try and test to move even an inch due to fear. My brain's thought processes were 100% working.

Please add English subtitles...

The only weird thing that's really happened to me was one day in early September I went into my back garden and my watering can was upsidedown on the grass. I never leave it upside-down, I'd used it the day before I'm sure. Its quite a large metal thing so I dont think it could have blown over, if it had it would have blown onto its side. Its possible it was a cat but im suprised the cat had the strength to flip it, I think more likely a fox maybe? There's a couple of other more ghostly things in my family but I didn't fully witness.

Queens, Another One Bites The Dust. Played backwards during the same lyrics. Clearly sez. "Decide to smoke marijuana." Blue Oyster Cults song Godzilla. Played backwards during the repeated lyrics of the word Godzilla, clearly sez. "Satan is a horse shoe. Worship Satan." I did this with my own albums back in the 80's. I selected the auxiliary switch on my turntable and spun the record backwards with my finger. The BOC album gave me a jolt of spine tingling fear and I immediately pulled it off the player and smashed it over my knee. I kept the Queen album. The Game. And within less than a year, decided to start smoking pot. Hehe.

I really loved this.I have had sleep paralysis all my life. Its exactly like he explained it . Very scary. The one about led zepplin was amazing✌😷

What’s really strange for me is the number I guessed for the previous question regarding birthdays was 23. How is it I skipped to the next question?

I am 65 so I'm not a phone addict as like the youngsters can be. Nevetherless something puzzles me : very very often, when I switch on my phone, the hour is what is called in french "heures miroir" for instance 08hO8 13 h 13, 17 h 17... I'd be curious to understand why... Before dying my father had promised, if possible, to send me signs... Perhaps is it the way he has choosen to tell me death is not and ending but a new chapter ?...

I like how he said we now know aliens don't exist. LOL 6 years ago this was made. Would love to see what he thinks now.

People really under estimate the power of suggestion.

Omg, I had to rewind, play..rewind, play a few times, but I'm pretty darn sure while showing and TALKING, about HENRY FUSELI's 1781painting of 'THE NIGHTMARE'.. he says the "The horse is peering through the *_GRAPES_* !!!! instead of DRAPES. 😂 (32:38/ 32:39). I spent the rest of the video waiting for him to say 'grapes' again and end up getting the audience to draw a picture of any type of fruit or something at the end, in a demonstration using the same method Derren Brown uses a lot, re: subconscious suggestive predictability, (via repetitive language) etc. Expecting most NOT familiar with this technique to a mostly draw.. grapes. 😂😂😂 Then, not long after (about 2mins) his fit bit goes off & he says "that's just my fit bit saying I've done 10,000? *STEPS* & I'm sitting here thinking 'nah mate, you're just flapping your hand around HEAPS!' Chris French is so funny and engaging! Half my professors talk me into a state of 'sleep paralysis' or a semi coma, through their bored monotone speech, and I can't recall a darn thing after the lecture! I wish they were all like this!! I'd probably get an A+ in EVERY subject!!😊✌🐨